The Executive Director of Youth Action International (YAI), Dr. Kimmie Weeks, has announced that his organization in partnership with the US-based NGO Waves4Water will begin to repair broken hand pumps across the country this year. Dr. Weeks made the statement over the weekend at the organization’s head office in Duport Road.

Dr. Weeks disclosed that Waves4Water is YAI’s long-standing partner for water and that both organizations have been involved in the distribution of portable water filters for close to five years now.

“Over the years, we have given hundreds of portable water filters to rural communities in Liberia and Sierra Leone, which have benefited thousands of families and given them access to safe and clean drinking water,” Dr. Weeks said.

He explained that while YAI and Waves4Water would continue to distribute the water filters, they would be adding a new component that would address the repairing of broken hand pumps across the country. Mr. Jack Rose, Executive Director of Waves4Water, observed that in Liberia and many parts of the world NGOs had adopted what he referred to as “guerilla humanitarianism.”

Said Mr. Rose: “Many of these handpumps started out as top-grade installations. But, after pump and parts are submerged in water for many years, they corrode and stop working. When this happens, an entire village must walk miles to muddy rivers to fetch contaminated water.”

In these cases, the organizations who started the installations have already gained the credit, moved on and are no longer interested in the fact that the villages and the people who depend on them no longer have a clean water source.

The two organizations are calling on communities who have broken wells to contact them to participate in the program by calling their hotlines: 0778555558 or emailing [email protected]

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